AusBonsai

Hi Jeremy,

Those are some nice benches and trees!

jeremy_norbury wrote: Bonus shot of what autumn looks like here - I know you don't get it.

The southern half of Australia gets autumn colours, The further south you go, the richer the colours. Here's a sample of this years autumn: Autumn 2015

Update on the plans - as a result of some work by a US builder, I've now added US/Imperial units pages to the plans with some schematics too.

I appreciate Australia is metric, but the prior links no longer work. The newest plans are here:

https://1drv.ms/b/s!Am79oDXO3yjRhc9EH8Q1wtFpW2vvoA

I see the basic problem here... the more shelves you make, the more plants you acquire, so you need more shelves!!!!!

It is similar to the Rules of Sheds. The available plants will always expand to fill the available bench space.

shibui wrote:It is similar to the Rules of Sheds. The available plants will always expand to fill the available bench space.

Yes, it's a problem, according to my dear wife.

10141452 by Jerry Norbury, on Flickr

This was built a couple weeks ago with inspiration from Bjorn.
School of Bonsai Simon got me started and we put a Ryobi drill and circular saw I received for Christmas to good use!













Prior to building this bench I was using sleepers on crates.





May more bonsai benches be built this year!
I might also look into a watering system this year.
Ciao for now!




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Boics wrote: ↑September 25th, 2013, 1:07 pm I'm using 70*35mm wood and 70*45mm instead.

Hey Boics, how did you end up going with these sizes? I'm looking at building one of these benches using those sizes.

I've done up plans, based on what Boics posted a few years ago, for what I'm planning to build. I don't quite have 2400mm of space so I'm going for a width of 2100mm. The frame is going to be built from 45x70mm treated pine (12 lengths of 2.4m should do it) which is a pretty standard dimension here in Australia. For the shelves I'll use 90x19mm merbau decking with a join in the middle - this will allow me to use 5400mm pieces, each cut into 5. 4 of these will allow me to do the top and middle, and completely cover the bottom shelf (with cutouts for the legs) to provide a bit of extra storage space for empty pots and such. This allows for an overhang of 10mm at the front, 0mm at the sides to allow for a possible future shade fixing, and a 5mm gap between each board.

I have some poly pipe and a bunch of drippers laying around, and a spare zone on my sprinkler controller, so I'll probably end up hiding some pipe under the frame for a built-in mostly hidden automated watering system.

All up the pine and decking is $315 delivered from a local timber place. The big green shed came in more expensive by about $50, and I'd have to sort out my own delivery. Coach screws will be around $20, screws for the shelves I have already, and another $20 for decking oil and I should be able to get this done for under $400 including beer.

Looks good Greg. My hubby built me something similar in metal, got it galvanised, and added wheels, so that I can move it around to follow the sun. My place faces north east, so winter sun on the deck is awesome, but in Summer things need to be moved to the south western side. If you can position the shelf to get the best of the sun you'll probably still find the bottom shelf is too dark for sun-loving trees, but it's a good place for plants that need a bit of protection from the sun. Good luck!

Here's a view from the security cam...

Thanks Mel, nice little area you've got yourself there! I have fairly small back yard but fortunately the space set aside for the bench gets pretty decent sun for most of the day, with a large tree providing shade during the late afternoon which helps on hot summer days. I also have an almost-two-year-old so that lower shelf probably won't get used at all for a while! Kiddo loves to look at my many plants which often involves her picking them up and wandering around with them. The pot I grabbed off of Gumtree on the weekend has already felt her wrath

I've ordered the timber for this and am hoping it'll get delivered by the weekend so I can make a start. I'll post a few updates as I make progress; hopefully it helps someone else out in the future.

Bottom shelf will be a good hiding place for your two year old then.

Oops, some corrections to my previous post - I need 8 (not 4) 5400mm decking boards, and the overhang is 35mm for the top shelf and 40mm for the middle and bottom shelves. Too many variations of plans floating about! So the total of the wood inc. delivery is actually $445, so make the whole thing under $500 including beer

Wood is scheduled for delivery next week - apparently everyone stuck at home is doing dodgy DIY projects like me so they're flat out and can't deliver earlier.

Here are my plans with the shelving added on.

Mel’s right when she said that the more shelves you build the more trees you get to fill them my last lot of shelves were a simple construction of Besser blocks set up in a stepped wall at each end and shelves of half thickness treated pine sleepers laid on them. Lightweight treated pine frame attached to the fence and covered with shadecloth. Then extended the watering system which is controlled by an automatic timer . The shelves needed no bolts or joinery and the job was done in an afternoon. I’ m not on the home computer tonight, so I’ll post a couple of pics when I get home.

Raging Bull wrote: ↑April 15th, 2020, 8:53 pm Mel’s right when she said that the more shelves you build the more trees you get to fill them

Yes... my wife hasn't quite clued in on that one yet! My current "bench" is an old heavy dining table that I saw out on the kerb a few blocks away a while back - I rolled it home myself at 6am, must've looked like a complete nutter (maybe because I am...?). My wife said I could only get what I could fit on the table, nothing more. I agreed until I ran out of room on that table and brought another one home that I found out on the kerb. Then I ran out of room on that one and had pots on the ground around the tables. Now I've got permission to build this bench because it'll look nicer, but "no more plants". We'll see how long that lasts...

"no more plants"

Sorry, that doesn't compute.....

It's a bit like giving up smoking, you can only do it when YOU are ready...